A Breakdown of Ideologies

The only reasons that Bukharin was considered to be the right-wing of the Bolsheviks was because he accepted socialism in one country, and supported the new economic policy. Otherwise he was very much a Communist ideologue. And coincidently, I think that most Communist parties now agree with him.

Soviet cogitations: 4779Defected to the U.S.S.R.: 12 May 2010, 07:43Ideology: Other LeftistPolitburo

15 Sep 2010, 05:56

Fitzy wrote:

Why would any communist support the NEP? The only reason I can think of is if you were a kulak or represented the kulaks.

Because of the idea that you need to transition from one type of society to another, I'm guessing.

Lenin saw that Russia was agrarian, not industrialized, and the NEP was designed to be a temporary measure to build up Russian economy so that it would become industrialized and be able to produce enough and create enough services for a socialist society. To try to jump from a feudal, agrarian society to an industrialized socialist one typically has its share of problems, if we are to look at Mao's Great Leap Forward, for example.

“Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals” - Mark Twain

Why would any communist support the NEP? The only reason I can think of is if you were a kulak or represented the kulaks.

I've just been noticing that many modern Communist parties seem to accept some sort of market socialism. This speech illustrates this. http://www.jcp.or.jp/english/jps_weekly/2002-0827-fuwa.html While I'd imagine that not all of the membership would be so supportive of a market based economy at all, the leadership of the main Communist parties around the world seem to be.

Why would any communist support the NEP? The only reason I can think of is if you were a kulak or represented the kulaks.

LOLLenin for example))))

If you want to discuss NEP you should know that it was a tactical retreat. In was never justified by bolsheviks ideologically, like opportunists talk about "market socialism". NEP wasn't a "market socialism", it was a temporary step to market in economy - but under hardest political control, with political and juridical restrictions against businessmen. Why USSR need NEP at all?

Because for a lot of management, organisational tasks in economy we needed a lot of specialists, but we hadn't them. Communists just couldn't organise all economic branches enough good without people, and they preferred to0 concentrate their power on most important, key branches, to make base for industrialisation. And in less strategically important branches they allowed business with a lot of restrictions against it. Then, when tasks of the period were accomplished, NEP was closed. Then collectivisation began.

It's the principal difference between bolsheviks' NEP and opportunists' "market socialism". Opportunists say business is good and is a part of socialism. Bolshevics said "ok, we have problem with these and these small enterprises. Let's give them to private owners for some time 'cause we've more important tasks for today and can't manage them". I hope I said it clear enough

Bolsheviks was against market but they could allow it under their hard control. Opportunists are for market and against socialism but they call it "market socialism".

Stalin managed to get control of the leadership after Lenin died. He based himself on the bureaucracy and the middle classes. He immediately swapped from the normal Marxist internationalism to the idea of Socialism In One Country. He also went back to the pre-1917 line that the Bolsheviks had which was that revolutions had to come in two stages - first capitalism and at a later date (decades later) socialism. This idea was called Stagism. So for instance in China he wanted a capitalist revolution headed by the capitalist KMT party, and he supported them in preference to the Communist Party (actually Mao also wanted China to be capitalist but he would not sumbit to the KMT for very good reasons - they frequently massacred communists).

Stagism came with the idea of Popular Fronts, collaboration with capitalists. It may surprise some people, but after 1934 Stalin's main goal was to set up capitalist governments in other countries, with these capitalist-CP coalitions. They generally fell apart quite quickly, especially in the post war period. Eastern Europe went Stalinist against his wishes. This is why Truman started the cold war.

Stalin actually tried to stop revolutions from attempting socialism eg in Spain. There, the Stalinists were in government with capitalists, and opposed the mass uprisings for socialism by the workers.

In the period 1928-34 Stalinism went through a zigzag called the Third Period. In this period Stalin was forced to collectivise in Russia to avoid the threat of the rising bourgeois taking over. The Comintern wrongly believed world revolution was about to happen, so instead of Popular fronts they did the extreme opposite, refusing even to collaborate with the German Social Democrats to block the fascists, with terrible consequences.

Trotskyism

Trotsky came up with the idea (called Permanent Revolution) in 1906 that world revolution might actually have to start in a backward country. This seemed odd to most Marxists because backward countries are the hardest places to imagine socialism, but Trotsky could see that in Russia the capitalist class was feeble and incapable of it's historical role of eliminating feudalism and colonialism. Lenin eventually agreed in 1917 and persuaded the rest of the reluctant Bolshevik leaders. The idea Lenin and Trotsky agreed on was that the working class would lead (even though most of the population were peasants) and that it would be the workers, led by the Bolsheviks, who would carry out what Marxists historically regarded as the 'tasks of the bourgeois revolution' while at the same time restricting the capitalists who no longer had any real function. Trotsky was kicked out of Russia in 1929 and continued to oppose Stalin in exile until Stalin had him assassinated. Trotskyists support socialist revolution, even in backward countries. However although revolution is most likely in backward countries socialism is also most difficult there, impossible in fact.

With this in mind, Lenin and Trotsky both stressed that although a backward country like Russia could spark world revolution, socialism could only be achieved if several advanced countries came to their aid with the own revolutions of course.

So, Stalinism was the result of the degeneration of the revolution in Russia, brought about by it's isolation meaning socialism was more or less impossible.

I'm not expert, but wasn't Bukharin against the NEP at first, siding with Trotsky in wanting to keep War Communism going. I feel like he shifted at some point to a rightist because he wanted to keep the NEP going over Stalin's 5 year plan.

I thought Trotsky supported the NEP at the start, with some reservations, he had actually proposed it a year earlier at the start of the trade union disputes. Bukharin was the big fan of the NEP however, he was Stalin's ally against Trotsky who wanted to curb it and wind it down. If Bukharin opposed it at the start that's a new one on me. Thing is, people were switching positions. Eg when Trotsky's initial proposal for ending war communism was originally rejected, he swung over to the opposite, doing war communism properly, ie re the labour force 'militarisation' thing. A year later he was arguing the opposite. This was because the situation was rapidly changing, and the NEP was starting. But it went too far, for too long, especially after 1924. I think Stalin's hatred of Trotsky, or fear actually as he was intellectually far superior, clouded his judgement and he (Stalin) based himself on Bukharin and the right, on the wealthy and the bureaucrats, partly simply because they were on the ascendancy as the revolution started to unravel, an partly to get at Trotsky. Basically Stalin went with the flow, the degeneration of the revolution.

I thought Trotsky supported the NEP at the start, with some reservations, he had actually proposed it a year earlier at the start of the trade union disputes.

That's false. During the trade union dispute, Trotsky argued for militarization of labor, incentive collectivization and heavy industrialization ASAP (at any cost). He eventually agreed that the NEP was necessary, although he always proposed to make it as short as possible.

theredstardelight wrote:

I'm not expert, but wasn't Bukharin against the NEP at first, siding with Trotsky in wanting to keep War Communism going. I feel like he shifted at some point to a rightist because he wanted to keep the NEP going over Stalin's 5 year plan.

As far as I've been able to gather, not exactly: Economically, Bukharin was a rightist, believing that a period of capitalism should stabilize and develop the economy. Politically, his theses were often close to the Workers' Opposition and other Left Communists.

Collectivization is not the only system that is flawed. So with the attitude of the peasants. If the peasants place themselves as or puts themselves in the shoes of ordinary salaried employees under capitalism, they would fulfill if not overfulfill their quotas. The problem was that the peasant had become greedy and discontented with what he has like refrigerators, televisions, radios or washing machines; these household appliances are hard to acquire under capitalism. Collectivization too is slightly, (I say very very slightly) flawed in that it should had extended the number of days the peasant was to work in his/her private plot to exploit for his/her personal consumption. But now that they had become aware of the flaws, collectivization can be perfected especially if we apply them in Venezuela and Cuba...

quote="daft punk" "I thought Trotsky supported the NEP at the start, with some reservations, he had actually proposed it a year earlier at the start of the trade union disputes."

That's false. During the trade union dispute, Trotsky argued for militarization of labor, incentive collectivization and heavy industrialization ASAP (at any cost). He eventually agreed that the NEP was necessary, although he always proposed to make it as short as possible.

No, Trotsky says in his bio that he proposed ending of war communism, ie a sort of NEP policy, right at the start of the trade union disputes. This was turned down so he proposed that if they were gonna keep war communism then they should do it properly. In the end the NEP was a adopted after the economy sat in the doldrums for a year.

"I submitted to the Central Committee the project of replacing the food levy by a grain-tax and of restoring the exchange of commodities.

“The present policy of equalized requisition according to the food scale, of mutual responsibility for deliveries, and of equalized distribution of manufactured products, tends to lower the Status of agriculture and to disperse the industrial proletariat, and threatens to bring about a complete breakdown in the economic life of the country.” In these words, I formulated my view in the statement submitted to the Central Committee in February, 1920.

“The food resources,” the statement continued, “are threatened with exhaustion, a contingency that no amount of improvement m the methods of requisition can prevent. These tendencies toward economic decline can be counteracted as follows: (1) The requisition of surpluses should give way to payment on a percentage basis (a sort of progressive income tax in kind), the scale of payment being fixed in such a way as to make an increase of the ploughed area, or a more thorough cultivation, still yield some profit; (2) a closer correspondence should be established between the industrial products supplied to the peasants and the quantities of grain they deliver; this applies not only to rural districts (volosts) and villages, but to the individual peasant households, as well.”

These proposals are very guarded. But the basic propositions of the New Economic Policy adopted a year later did not at first go any farther."

Don't Trotskyists think that the bourgeois revolution is to be carried out in backwards countries by the peasantry and proletariat, as the bourgeoisie in such countries are too limited in number, then the proletarian revolution is to be fulfilled only after the tasks of the bourgeois revolution have been completed? Then why do Trots moan about the USSR being "state capitalist"? Doesn't the successful completion of a revolution take at least a few decades of serious industrialisation and social development? For instance, it took well around 2 centuries after the Commonwealth days for the British monarchy to stop meddling, despite them still technically holding damn near to absolute powers. It just seems a pretty ridiculous position to have for me, DP, your post seems to imply Stalin was in cahoots with international capital whereas Trotsky wouldn't have been, which seems a very tenuous position that I would like to see some hard evidence for. I simply don't see any merit in supporting Trotsky or Stalin really, if I am being honest. Two guys long dead, two guys with extremely inflated mythologies and legends to their name.

I also don't see how capitalism cannot develop in one country, after all, if the Bolshevik revolution was simply about carrying out the bourgeois revolution in whatever time-frame, then consider the fact that British capitalism required an empire for the sake of markets and importantly resources foreign to British soil, whilst Russia is vast and has pretty much anything you could ever need within its own boundaries and within the Union as a whole - the potential of regionally depressed labour markets to exploit, all the coal, timber, cotton, tobacco, sugar, wheat etc. you would ever need, a class of engineers from both pre-, until needless speculation arose surrounding their political allegiance and then subsequent executions or exiles, and post-revolution who could administer and steer production.

If the Bolsheviks themselves, Trotsky too, admitted socialism wasn't an immediate goal, then on what grounds are there to complain at all? They seem to imply that the state was to be the capitalist-in-abstract. To be counter-revolutionary in the case of Russia was to be a feudalist, which Stalin clearly wasn't.

"Hoxhaism" is an informal term used to refer to a variant of anti-revisionist Marxism–Leninism that developed in the late 1970s due to a split in the Maoist movement, appearing after the ideological row between the Communist Party of China and the Party of Labour of Albania in 1978.

The Albanians rallied a new separate international tendency. This tendency would demarcate itself by a strict defense of the legacy of Joseph Stalin and fierce criticism of virtually all other Communist groupings as revisionist. Critical of the United States, the Soviet Union, China, and Yugoslavia, Enver Hoxha declared the latter three to be social-imperialist and condemned the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia by withdrawing from the Warsaw Pact in response.

Hoxha declared Albania to be the world's only state legitimately adhering to Marxism–Leninism after 1978. The Albanians were able to win over a large share of the Maoists, mainly in Latin America such as the Popular Liberation Army and Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador, as well as the Communist Party of Brazil, but also had a significant international following in general. This tendency has occasionally been labeled as 'Hoxhaism' after him.

After the fall of the Communist government in Albania, the pro-Albanian parties are grouped around an international conference and the publication Unity and Struggle.

"Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas?" - Stalin

A Marxist-Leninist is one who upholds the theories of Marx, Engels and Lenin and other revolutionaries. We uphold Revolutionary principles such as: The Dictatorship of the Proletariat, Stagism, Pragmatism, Democratic Centrism, Dialectical Materialism, Scientific Socialism, Historical Materialism, Vanguardism, Socialist Patriotism, and Proletarian Internationalism.A Marxist-Leninist is also one who follows Realpolitik and Pragmatism while making policies. We hold that material considerations have to be made when making such policies, and that those policies must be compatible with material conditions before being applied. As material conditions are changed, it is necessary for qualitative changes to be made to ensure development continues.

We bitterly despise the Bourgeois Capitalists, as they are our greatest enemy, although we uphold Capitalism as necessary for the evolution of the Dialectic..

There are other variants of Marxist-Leninism, such as Hoxhaism, but the prime example of a Marxist-Leninist was the former General Secretary of CPSU Joseph Stalin. We also hold that Stalinism is Marxism-Leninism as applied according to the conditions of the USSR from the 1920s-56, while Hoxhaism was Marxism-Leninism as applied from the 1940s-85. We also point again to Comrade Stalin, who, in his 1951 Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR, made suggestions for the Soviet Union to change its economic policies, in the coming future, to insure that it matched the changed material conditions of the USSR since the '20s.

The ultimate objective of Marxism-Leninism is to achieve Communism, where all power is vested in local Soviets, or labor councils, which distribute products according to need and manage local economies exclusively. Our belief is that such a state of things will be created naturally, as there are inherent contradictions in Capitalism and Socialism which will lead to Communism.

Marxism-Leninism is just Stalinism and has nothing to do with the teachings of Marx.

Albania, under Hoxha was one of the most brutal and repressive regimes that ever existed. But it was fun watching the various CP over the globe backslide over Hoxha’s alliances. He broke with the USSR and people claimed that Albania was a true communist state and the others were revisionist. Then he entered into an alliance with China and suddenly the Maoists were true communists too.

Don't Trotskyists think that the bourgeois revolution is to be carried out in backwards countries by the peasantry and proletariat, as the bourgeoisie in such countries are too limited in number, then the proletarian revolution is to be fulfilled only after the tasks of the bourgeois revolution have been completed?

No, permanent revolution posits that when the proletariat begins to carry out the tasks of the bourgeois democratic revolution, it can't help but implement socialist measures immediately, not "only after". In such a situation, socialist measures can be enacted way before all of the bourgeois democratic tasks have been fully completed.

Quote:

Then why do Trots moan about the USSR being "state capitalist"?

They don't. The cliffites do, but they're a minority and their position is wrong. Ted Grant already destroyed it in 1949, in his spectacular document Against the Theory of State Capitalism, which is really worth a read because it is one of the very few post-Lenin Marxist documents that actually contains an essential further development of Marxism that is indisposable if you want a solid understanding of what happened in the world after 1945.

Quote:

If the Bolsheviks themselves, Trotsky too, admitted socialism wasn't an immediate goal, then on what grounds are there to complain at all? They seem to imply that the state was to be the capitalist-in-abstract. To be counter-revolutionary in the case of Russia was to be a feudalist, which Stalin clearly wasn't.

Trotsky didn't say that. Lenin and Trotsky acted with the perspective of relatively short-term world revolution. The "grounds to complain" are that the post-1924 leadership of the USSR didn't really act on a socialist programme and none of its policies other than industrialization-collectivization represented anything like a movement towards communism. And even that was done in a horrendously bad way.